1.2 Tools and Resources

Hey guys, welcome back to Event Flyer Design. My name is Kirk Nelson. This is lesson number two, where we talk briefly about the tools and resources that are needed for this course. First and foremost, this is a PhotoShop based course, so you will need PhotoShop. I happen to be using PhotoShop CC, the version that was updated in the spring of 2014. Although I'm not using very many of the new features from PhotoShop CC, the instruction can be used as far back as I believe, CS 5. But if you have CS 6 or CC, you should be able to follow along just fine. Along with that, I am actually using Adobe Bridge CC. Again, it's the same version, it was updated in the spring of 2014. And along with that, I'm using Adobe Camera Raw version 8.4. Now both bridge and camera raw come packaged along with PhotoShop. You do not need to buy them independently. You just need to make sure that they are downloaded and updated from your CC subscription. Now as far as tools, those are the only required tools to complete the course. Now recommended tools, I'm going to go ahead and include a nice DSLR. I'm using a Nikon D5100, because we are going to do a little bit of photography in this course, cuz I think it's important to learn how to shoot your own stock photos to use for the concepts and the designs that you're going to be working on. I also have just a basic photographer's light kit, some lights, some umbrellas, some umbrella stands, and some backdrops. This is not a very complex or complicated kit. It's really one of the most basic ones that you can purchase. Along with that, I also have grabbed a couple of sports balls, and found a field somewhere to shoot in. Again I reiterate, these are not required elements for this course. These are resources that I've used to complete these projects. And I don't expect you to have them. If you do have them or if you have the ability to borrow or get them, that is excellent. I fully encourage you to go ahead and make use of them, because you'll get a better learning experience from these projects. But if you do not have the ability to do that, I'm also including my files free for you to use. So you can use the photographs that I've taken for your projects. Along those same lines, let's talk about the source files. Now, there are source files for every single lesson that requires source files in the course files that's included with the course. I have them sorted out according to lesson number and a brief name. And you can see when we go in there, that I even have the different photographs also sorted out. Now these are all raw files, which means you're not gonna be able to see them unless you are using something like Bridge, that allows you to view camera raw files. Also, the source PSD files is included within these source files. Now, I do need to make note that the PSD that are here represent the end state of that lesson, not the beginning state. Cuz these lessons generally build upon the previous one. So I think it makes more sense to show where you end up at the end of say, lesson six here. So to begin lesson six, you will actually have the file from lesson five open, I'm hoping you'll be able to do these mostly in sequence, so it will just be a very natural flow. Okay guys, that's all that I really have for, as far as housekeeping is concerned, and the source files. And talking slightly about the different tools and resources that we have. It's time to get things started. Let's go ahead and launch lesson number three and begin sketching.